CapeTalk Highlights

Stalin’s Daughter is a book written by Biographer and poet Rosemary Sullivan. CapeTalk's John Maytham was joined by Sullivan at the Open Book Festival live broadcast to talk about this biography about Stalin's daughter.

In the book Sullivan explores a complicated character of a daughter of a communist, the man who forced industrialisation of the Soviet Union and caused the worst man-made famine in history, and who was responsible for the deaths of millions of his people.

She explores Svetlana Alliluyeva's character without ever losing sight of her powerfully human story, so well narrated in the book.

When I read her obituary in the New Yorker, where she was quoted as saying no matter where i go whether an island or Australia, I will always be the political prisoner of my father's name...

— Rosemary Sullivan

A woman who'd go from the reach of tragedy to that kind of humour had to be interesting

— Rosemary Sullivan

The tragedy began with the suicide of her mother, though of course the close universe of the Kremlin was so tight... that no one was allowed to know that it was suicide...

— Rosemary Sullivan

Listen to the full conversation below:

In John Maytham's words, "the Open Book Festival introduces you to books that you otherwise might not have read".

Elnathan John is a full time writer who lives and works in Nigeria. His first novel Born on a Tuesday, tells a story of a young man named Dantala. He moves from his home to a place where he gets caught up with bad elements and is forced to go on the run.

He makes his way to a mosque that provides him with food, shelter, and guidance.

I am particularly interested in the other aspects of the book which is brotherhood and the connections between people, different ways of friendship and bonds..

— Elnathan John, author

Even if you are writing a political story the political is personal, the way people are positioned in a society that is political

— Elnathan John, author

To write a story that adds nuance to the one dimensional Boko Haram, violence, bombings story in the Northern part of Nigeria, that is important to me